Cast
your mind back to the early-mid eighties. It was a time of crime-fighting vehicle-orientated
television shows such as Knight Rider, Street Hawk and of course Airwolf! For
those who don't remember, Airwolf was a super high-tech helicopter piloted by
Vietnam veteran Stringfellow Hawke. Each week Hawke would pilot Airwolf in order
to fight the bad guys, rescue the good guys or just avoid the 'star of the show'
(the helicopter) from falling into the wrong hands.

The Airwolf game
for the Atari 8 bit computers was originally programmed under the title Blue
Thunder. This was the film that perhaps inspired Airwolf, and in fact was turned
into a television series as well, although less successful than Airwolf. Unfortunately,
the game has changed little from its Blue Thunder origins, with the helicopter
graphic still coloured blue and its shape bearing no resemblance to the Airwolf
from the TV series.

As pilot of Airwolf,
your mission in the game is to rescue five scientists being held hostage on
a remote island. To reach each scientist you have to avoid defences including
land and sea missiles, plus in later levels - electric storms and armoured barrage
balloons. The scientists are protected by a shield, which can only be opened
by destroying the control box, located behind its own defensive barrier.

There
are five levels in all, with the first four selectable from the main title screen.
Each level is made up of the same terrain, but with an increasing number of
obstacles and enemies. By the last level, you must travel at night with lightning
and the full enemy arsenal to contend with.

I can't help but
compare Airwolf to the classic Atari helicopter game Fort Apocalypse (1982 -
Synapse Software), which had better sound effects and above all manoeuvrability.
Now I know they are two different kinds of helicopters, but I'm sure Airwolf
(Blue Thunder) would be able to move faster and handle better than it does in
this game. You have the ability to shoot and drop bombs, but this has no effect
on gun turrets, balloons or submarines.

What
makes the game particular hard on later levels is lack of fuel, which runs out
pretty quickly whilst you're dodging the various obstacles, including clouds
and balloons. The only place to get more fuel is the enemy prison, with not
even a drop of fuel apparently available on your home battleship. It would have
been nice to refuel halfway through the level, and conveniently there is a landing
area next to a hanger in the game, which doesn't seem to have any purpose in
the game. Maybe that was the plan of the programmers all along, but they forgot
to implement the refuelling option?

When
you finally land to pick up a scientist, a strange bug is discovered - as a
never ending stream of men enter your craft, although you only ever rescue one
at a time! Overall, a poor attempt at a Fort Apocalypse clone, which feels unpolished
and would have been better if you could actually destroy the guns, balloons
or submarines.

"Fwooop!
Fwooop!"(5/10)

GAME
TIPS
Your fuel will start to deplete as soon as the Mission begins, so don't wait
around!
Submarine sea-to-air missiles, Land-to-air missiles and Jet Fighters are the
only targets which can be destroyed by your shots.

CLICK
HERE to Download an Unlimited Lives file for use in the Atari 800Win
Emulator.

The version of Airwolf released for
the Atari 8bit Computers, was released under its original title Blue Thunder
for the ZX Spectrum and Commodore 64 by Richard Wilcox Software. A dedicated
version of Airwolf was then released for both systems by Elite. In 1987, Kyugo
released a pretty good Airwolf side-scrolling shoot-em-up as an Arcade machine,
this included the excellent theme tune. The most recent Airwolf game released
was for the NES (Nintendo Entertainment System) in 1988.